Aihearkisto: osaaminen

Network of Networks in Glasgow

ECVET, henkilöstö, kielitaito, kilpailutoiminta, kotikansainvälisyys, koulutusjärjestelmät, koulutusvienti, opiskelijaliikkuvuus, osaaminen, rahoitus, saapuvat opiskelijat

35 members from 16 VET colleges and four other organisations came together on Monday 2 October in Glasgow for three consecutive days of discussions and sharing project ideas. The Finnish network was represented by staff from all four VET providers Tredu, Varia, Salpaus and Jyväskylä.Jyväskylä Educational Consortium was represented by Chief IT and Quality Officer, Hanna Rajala and International Coordinators Milka Niskanen and Rea Tuominen.

Network of Networks is a cooperation forum of five national networks; Finn Net from Finland, The Dutch Alliance from the Netherlands, Colleges Partnership from West Scotland, Colleges NI from Northern Ireland and HETEL from the Basque country in Spain.

Topics discussed during the first project workshops were among other things: skills mismatch, digitalisation, continous professional development of VET staff, preparing VET staff for a less classroom based future as well as collaboration for improving commercial income streams.

More information Rea Tuominen

Competence Test Assessments in Qatarian Context

koulutusjärjestelmät, koulutusvienti, osaaminen

Learning Assistant Education

Competence Test Assessments in Qatarian Context, June 2017

Jyväskylä Educational Consortium started to organize Further Qualification in Learning Support and Morning and Afternoon Club Activity in Doha, Qatar, in autumn 2016. Our role is to organize preparatory training and competence test assessments there.

We – Kaisa Lassila and Jyrki Veistämö two teachers visiting Doha – had a great opportunity to be a part in this process. We travelled to Doha, Qatar in June 2017 to assess Learning Assistants´ competence tests in Qatar-Finland International School (QFIS). Our trip to Doha started from Tikkakoski and the weather was quite typical of Finnish summer: +4 degrees Celsius and a little bit cloudy. When we arrived in Doha in the afternoon, the weather was sunny and the temperature was plus 38 degrees Celsius. In the airport the taxi driver said that the weather would get even warmer during the week. There was also the Ramadan season going on so all the shops and restaurants were closed during the day.

 

There are eleven learning assistant students studying Further Qualification in Learning Support and Morning and Afternoon Club Activity/Instruction. The students come from different cultures. They had two competence test assessments: UNIT 1 (Working in the occupation) and Unit 2 (providing support and guidance for growth and development). Learning assistants (LA) work at QFIS in different grades; in Grade 0 the students are four-five years old, in grade 1 five-six years old, in grade 2 seven-eight years old. In grade 0 the LA is present in the classroom all the time, but in the upper grades the LA is a ”floating assistant” helping students in different subjects like maths, Arabic, English etc.


Now a few words about the assessment process. All the learning assistants and also each employer representative/ assessor (class teachers) and employee representative/assessor were carefully prepared to assess both of these modules and different assessment targets and criteria. Also all the LAs had done a great job both with the actual work during the competence test days in both modules and filling in their self-assessment forms. The assessment meetings were held at school and they took about an hour per candidate. First we gave an opportunity to the candidate to go through their self-assessment and then there were excellent professional discussions on how different targets showed in the candidates’ daily work. Learning assistants were very professional and they all passed both modules.

We think that the assessment process was quite similar in both countries. Every one of us thought that the assessment meeting was a great opportunity to get valuable feedback of our work and a possibility to reflect on how we work. On behalf of our Institute we were very satisfied that the QFIS staff had done so wonderful job to guarantee that the practical arrangements were well organized. To guarantee that everything will go well in the future as well, we have to keep up discussions about the partner’s expectations of good practices concerning the competence test and the assessment.

 

During the week we also had an opportunity to explore Doha. The City of Doha was very clean, friendly, hot and sunny. We went to see different shopping malls and we also visited the Souq Waqif bazaar area, Pearl area, and the MIA’s (Museum of Islamic Art). After the working days we relaxed by walking in the seafronts and admiring the skyscrapers and all the amazing cars. It was something you won´t see every day in Finland.

More information Marleena Tuuri (at)jao.fi

 

Nature Tourism in Finland

ECVET, kielitaito, kotikansainvälisyys, osaaminen, saapuvat opiskelijat

Tourism Activities programme has hosted the first official international study module on nature sports tourism in Jyväskylä 14 August – 8 September 2017. 

Teachers Hanna Syvälahti and Timo Lehtonen, led by Programme Manager Eeva-Liisa Hjelt, have created a 3-4 week module that integrates the incoming students into a Finnish class and immerses all participants into the possibilities of Finnish nature tourism. The incoming participants were 9 learners from SŠGT Celje High school for tourism (Slovenia) and 5 learners from BBS Wittmund (Germany).  The concept has been tested and developed in previous years, with participants from Germany, Estonia and Italy.  The programme this time included e.g. kayaking, fat biking, nature trails, Finnish food and sauna culture, a variety of summer activities as well as great events.  For the Finnish students the module has also been an excellent opportunity for Internationalisation at Home (IaH).

The module is developed based on the current teaching programme at our college with the help of the ECVET recommendation to facilitate easier validation and recognition at the sending organisations. The module is described in terms of learning outcomes (knowledge, skills and competences) and the assessment is done in a valid, reliable and transparent manner.

The expected learning outcomes of the module were:

  • to use appropriate equipment in different situations (various outdoor activities)
  • to take care of equipment (maintenance)
  • to take care of different venues (preparatory tasks, service, cleaning, maintenance)
  • to utilize sector specific language in customer service situations and guiding (English)
  • to take responsibility for guidance
  • to take care of own safety and to take care of customer safety (theory of safety plans in practical assignments)
  • to co-operate in his/her working community, to work in a team
  • to assess his/her own work and actions

The  development of the module will continue in the Winter School which will take place in March 2018, when the Ma17b class  will study nature tourism activities in completely different conditions with another group of incoming Erasmus students.

Photos courtesy of SŠGT Celje

More information:

Teachers Hanna Syvälahti (at)jao.fi and Timo Lehtonen

International Coordinator Rea Tuominen (at)jao.fi

GBS St. Gallen in Jyväskylä

Board  members of GBS St. Gallen from Switzerland have visited Jyväskylä Educational Consortium for two very  intensive days 24-25 August 2017. 

The visitors were given an extensive overview of the organisation, education system and all the development going on at the moment. GBS St. Gallen is since several years a partner for the media  sector (printing, photography). They are also one of the external partners in the KA2 project Commercialpolis. One of the concrete aims of this visit was to expand this cooperation to other fields and to the strategic level as well.

Amongst many other things the principals and managers of GBS St Gallen (name list below) were introduced to Finnish vocational teacher training,  development regarding digitalisation of both processes and learning, quality assurance, language teaching and guidance processes. Teacher training was presented by Harri Keurulainen, Hannele Torvinen and Tuulia Kiilavuori from JAMK Teacher Education College.

Thursday afternoon the visitors met with Principal Pirjo Kauhanen to discuss the organisational changes and the VET reform.

Friday morning was devoted to regional development and global partnerships presented by Director of Development Anu Tokila and Programme Manager Marleena Tuuri.

 

During the visit both parties found out that, although there are significant systemic level differences, there are a lot of similiarities on strategic level that can be advanced through cooperation between the two VET providers. In the more immediate future there is hope to work on issues around digitalisation as well as staff and student mobilities. We are expecting the first mobilities to take place during this school year from electrical engineering and hairdressing programmes.

Participants from GBS St. Gallen

  • Lukas Reichle, director of GBS
  • Daniel Kehl,  deputy-director of GBS, head of vocational education and training at GBS
  • Thomas Klement, head of the technical departement of GBS
  • Patrik Forrer, head of the school of design of GBS
  • Nicole Bauer, head of KSD – social care team of GBS
  • Jürg Pfeiffer, head of paedagogical advice and support team of GBS
  • Michael Andrist, head of IT at GBS

More information on the Commercialpolis project:

http://www.commercialpolis.eu/project/about-commercialpolis/ project

Picture credit: Daniel Kehl

More information: Rea Tuominen, international coordinator

 

Trainee teachers from Germany

kotikansainvälisyys, koulutusjärjestelmät, osaaminen

Who are you and where do you come from?
My name is Lisa. I am 30 years old and come from Darmstadt. I love music and traveling around the world to get to know different cultures. Before studying I worked as a hairdresser. I love the creativity of this job. Because of that I decided to become a teacher for the haidressers.

My name is Kathrin, I am 29 years old and I come from Frankfurt. Before I decided to attend the trainee teacher program, I studied “Social Work“. I worked in a bilingual kindergarten and an after school club for primary school pupils. During my studies, I spent an “Erasmus“ term abroad in Stockholm and worked for a social project in Buenos Aires, which definitely encouraged me to apply for the“Erasmus Plus Program“ in Jyväskylä.

I am Michaela, a 25 year old trainee teacher from Germany, living in a small town next to Frankfurt. Since September 2016 I teach the kindergarten teachers pedagogy and politics. Before that I studied social pedagogy and worked as a social worker in the kindergarten and later on in youth welfare services. I like traveling and getting to know new people and cultures.

My name is Janine, I am 38 years old and come from Kassel. I studied Business Administration and English. In my freetime I like spending time with my family and doing some sports like Yoga. I am interested in meeting people from different cultures and countries.

What are you studying?
We are trainee teachers at vocational schools in Germany. Our subjects are “Hairdressing“ and “Politics“ (Lisa), “Business Administration“ and “English“ (Janine), “Early Childhood Education“ and “Politics“ (Michaela and Kathrin).

What have you been doing in Jyväskylä?
We stayed three weeks in Jyväskylä and prolonged our stay with a cruise from Helsinki to St. Petersburg, Tallinn and Stockholm. During our stay we got to know the different campuses of “Jyväskylä AO“. We got a great overview of different programs related to our vocational subjects. We also presented the German school system to the students and teachers to compare similarities and highlight differences.

Trying to be typical Finnish, we went ice swimming! It was incredible and highly encourage it. The Finnish sauna afterwards was amazing! We also attended an ice hockey game, which we recommend. We also explored around the town, visited the Toivola Old Courtyard, went up the tower of Jyvläskylä and visited the church.

Do you think the time has been too short/long?
The length of time was exactly right. The program is mixed and well-organized which made the time fly by. It gave us a great overview about the Finnish school system from pre-school programs to vocational trainings and also the adult education training. Also the Introductions about the background of these programs where very helpful to understand the Finnish way of education. After school, especially in the evenings and on the weekends, we had plenty of time to explore Jyväskylä, with helpful recommendations of the teachers.

What have you learned during your stay?
In any case, all the Finish people we have met, left a great impact. They were all extremely friendly and helpful!

Concerning the vocational school, we realized that the school system is different to the German one. The main difference might be, that in Jyväskylä, they do a lot of practical work in school, whereas in Germany, most of the practical work is done at the workplaces. The hairdressers for example have their own client service at school or the practical nurses organized gym lessons for elderly people at school.

The practical nurse program is different to the kindergarten teacher program (Erzieherausbildung) in Germany. Finnish students get a great overview during their studies about working in child care, but also rehabilitation or dental care and working as a nurse for example. To become a kindergarten teacher, they have to continue studying at an university.

A big difference is also that Finnish students get free lunch at school!
Students at Jyväskylä College have a great chance to go abroad during their vocational programs, which the school encourages.

What have been the best moments during your stay?
We felt very welcome during the whole stay at Jyväskylä. Finnish people were cordial all the time. The teachers, the hosts, people in the streets and in the shops. They all were very helpful and made our trip great.

We saw nice places all around Jyväskylä as well, like old factories, shops and countryside.
At the hairdressing and beauty department we all were invited to enjoy a full-body-massage. It was an amazing experience to see (and feel) how independent the students of the first year were working.

We got to know a great overview of different situations of the schools daily routine. For example visiting elderly people and a kindergarten in the social and healthcare department or different workplaces in the business sector.

Also our weekends were very exciting. We stayed 2 days on a lake near Laukaa. We relaxed in nature directly at the lake while sitting in a hot tub and using a real Finnish sauna.
We also went to Lappland for 2 days to see Santa in the Christmas Village and some northern lights. Very impressing!

Give three tops and tips (based on your own experience) to someone who is planning to come to Jyväskylä.
1. Jump into frigid waters and ice swim followed by a traditional Finnish sauna!
2. Go to an ice hockey game!
3. Renting a cottage at the lake, equipped with a hot tub and sauna.
4. Dive into the Culture! Meet Finnish people, eat typical Finnish food and try local drinks.

More information: Rea Tuominen p.6159